Writing Fan Fiction

For the last week and a bit, I've been writing fan fiction. It makes me realize how much I've missed writing it. I love to write fan fiction. I've been writing fan fiction long before I even knew there was such a thing. It's really how I got started writing. I would take other peoples characters and put them into other peoples situations to make something unique. Okay, blatantly plagiaristic. Hey, I was between the ages of five and twelve. I didn't know anything about copyright infringement. At least until I got zero on my report in grade 3 for copying out the book. Its how my imagination began to blossom. For years, my main focus had been on Commander Keen and inventing new adventures, characters, enemies for him. He had a bat cave and a mermaid girlfriend and everything. Looking back on it now, it was kind of silly while being really really cool.

I guess I'd still be writing the same way if it hadn't been for my Uncle Ed. He asked me why don't I create something for myself. And like that, my life was changed forever. He and I created something unique. Or at least less blatantly plagiaristic. We created a metal being, whose planet was destroyed by human miners, who kills the humans on his world and heads for earth for revenge, only to be sent back in time to Earth before the miners left and he has to stop them for even going. As I came up with ideas, my uncle would write down one word themes. Little did I know, this would be my first introduction to plot elements and construction.

Since that day, I still stole other peoples situations and gadgets and ships and planet names, but I started to develop my own characters and way of writing. And as I went along, I got better and better and soon my work could stand alone as its own two feet as an original work. But I still love to do fan fiction.

To me, fan fiction is an art form of its own. Its a challenge to see how well you know the characters. Not necessarily their past story and every little detail about them. But the general idea of them. What are they like? How would they react? What would they do? And that's what I play around with in my fan fiction. And most of all, try to have fun with it. If you're not having fun with it, why even bother?

The first story I ever published on the internet was a fan fiction. An adult fan fiction to be precise. That is a fan fiction that involves adult situations. It was a short little tale based off of the video game Neverwinter Nights. A short tale that became an epic novel filled with fantasy and sex. And one that broke off from its video game fan fiction roots and took on a lot of its own creation. Which makes it harder to write. While I wanted to write this novel with all its wonderful characters, I had to remember half of them were not mine. And I couldn't change the characters that weren't mine to be mine because it wouldn't be fair to the work. Its a fan fiction and a sequel to the game. Plus, I never ever got feed back. A hundred hits a week, but no feed back. It just do well for my self esteem. So I stopped posting them. But I still write them once and a while.

So for now, I'll write them privately and work on my book. But fan fiction will always hold a place in my heart.

Peace and blessings
Eric Rawlinson
20110325